China Imposing New Game Restrictions Soon

20 Mar 2009 at 15:05:04 by Bill Vaughan

China's General Administration of Press and Publication (GAPP) is gearing up to implement stricter gaming restrictions, shutting down games that do not meet the new regulations.

A report on JLM Pacific Epoch today claims that the GAPP will close down games that do not operate the fatigue system, which rewards players with less experience points in games depending on the amount of time they have been online. The GAPP will reportedly not allow new games to be released in China unless they have the system in place.

A new real-name authentication system is also being put in place soon to prevent players from abusing the fatigue system.

The9, who runs World of Warcraft in China, already has the fatigue system in its games along with six other companies. A trial of fatigue was implemented to World of Warcraft in 2008, The9 activated it on selected servers, which resulted in players transferring en masse to servers without the system in place.

This comes after earlier news that China intends to tighten up on imported online games in an attempt to prevent Chinese youths from being overly exposed to foreign cultures.

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